Aaron FILLER, MD

Dr. Aaron Filler filed a complaint against former patient Susan Walker in Los Angeles Superior Court on May 31, 2011. In his complaint, Filler alleged defamation and interference with prospective economic advantage in response to Walker’s review of Dr. Filler on a physician rating site.

On August 24, 2011, Walker filed a motion to strike based on California Code of Civil Procedure §§ 425.16 and 45, California’s anti-SLAPP statute. Walker’s motion argues that Walker is shielded from liability as the “dissemination of consumer information about medical care is a vital ‘public issue’ and the internet is a ‘public forum’,” and that Dr. Filler is a public figure subject to the burden of proving actual malice. Dr. Filler filed an opposition to this motion on September 16, 2011, also requesting leave to amend the complaint to plead more specific factual allegations to establish actual malice. Walker replied to Filler’s opposition on September 22, 2011.

#2–Dennis Laurion is still fighting this defamation case by Dr. David C. McKee: “When a doctor hires a private detective to find out which one of the 4,400 nurses in St. Louis County, MN may have called him a “tool” you know the man is serious about defending his reputation. That is just what Dr. David McKee of Northland Neurology and Myology is doing in preparation for the next leg of his defamation lawsuit against the son of a former patient, Dennis Laurion…”

Earlier this year, I wrote a story about Gary Votour’s legal battle with neurosurgeon Dr. Sagun Tuli. Votour’s wife, Lyn, died of complications from bone cancer and soon after, he blogged about his dissatisfaction with the medical care Tuli had given her.

Tuli filed a $100,000 defamation lawsuit against him in Middlesex Superior Court in February.

Given the fervent reader interest in Votour’s situation, I want to provide an update on the case, as well as on another lawsuit I mentioned in my April story. It was brought by California neurosurgeon Dr. Aaron Filler against a former patient in 2011.

Dr. Filler said sometimes a physician needs to take strong action. He sued a former patient in a Los Angeles court for posting negative comments about him on rating sites such as RateMDs.com, including “stating falsely that information she has seen suggested Dr. Filler posed an unusually high risk of death to patients,’’ according to his complaint.

Dr. Filler says he brought the case in part because none of his patients had died. While a judge dismissed Filler’s original suit, he said in a recent interview that he was able to get the patient, Susan Walker, to remove her comments and that additional litigation is pending. (In fact, the comment about risk of death was posted again by the patient from another site.) The comments “caused huge harm because there are hundreds of people suffering in pain right now’’ because they are too afraid to seek care from him, he said.